Islam in West Africa

Islam in West Africa PDF Author: John Spencer Trimingham
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 262

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Book Description

Islam in West Africa

Islam in West Africa PDF Author: John Spencer Trimingham
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 262

Get Book Here

Book Description


Beyond Timbuktu

Beyond Timbuktu PDF Author: Ousmane Oumar Kane
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674969359
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 295

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Book Description
Renowned for its madrassas and archives of rare Arabic manuscripts, Timbuktu is famous as a great center of Muslim learning from Islam’s Golden Age. Yet Timbuktu is not unique. It was one among many scholarly centers to exist in precolonial West Africa. Beyond Timbuktu charts the rise of Muslim learning in West Africa from the beginning of Islam to the present day, examining the shifting contexts that have influenced the production and dissemination of Islamic knowledge—and shaped the sometimes conflicting interpretations of Muslim intellectuals—over the course of centuries. Highlighting the significant breadth and versatility of the Muslim intellectual tradition in sub-Saharan Africa, Ousmane Kane corrects lingering misconceptions in both the West and the Middle East that Africa’s Muslim heritage represents a minor thread in Islam’s larger tapestry. West African Muslims have never been isolated. To the contrary, their connection with Muslims worldwide is robust and longstanding. The Sahara was not an insuperable barrier but a bridge that allowed the Arabo-Berbers of the North to sustain relations with West African Muslims through trade, diplomacy, and intellectual and spiritual exchange. The West African tradition of Islamic learning has grown in tandem with the spread of Arabic literacy, making Arabic the most widely spoken language in Africa today. In the postcolonial period, dramatic transformations in West African education, together with the rise of media technologies and the ever-evolving public roles of African Muslim intellectuals, continue to spread knowledge of Islam throughout the continent.

Remaking Islam in African Portugal

Remaking Islam in African Portugal PDF Author: Michelle Johnson
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253052769
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 193

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Book Description
When Guinean Muslims leave their homeland, they encounter radically new versions of Islam and new approaches to religion more generally. In Remaking Islam in African Portugal, Michelle C. Johnson explores the religious lives of these migrants in the context of diaspora. Since Islam arrived in West Africa centuries ago, Muslims in this region have long conflated ethnicity and Islam, such that to be Mandinga or Fula is also to be Muslim. But as they increasingly encounter Muslims not from Africa, as well as other ways of being Muslim, they must question and revise their understanding of "proper" Muslim belief and practice. Many men, in particular, begin to separate African custom from global Islam. Johnson maintains that this cultural intersection is highly gendered as she shows how Guinean Muslim men in Lisbon—especially those who can read Arabic, have made the pilgrimage to Mecca, and attend Friday prayer at Lisbon's central mosque—aspire to be cosmopolitan Muslims. By contrast, Guinean women—many of whom never studied the Qur'an, do not read Arabic, and feel excluded from the mosque—remain more comfortably rooted in African custom. In response, these women have created a "culture club" as an alternative Muslim space where they can celebrate life course rituals and Muslim holidays on their own terms. Remaking Islam in African Portugal highlights what being Muslim means in urban Europe and how Guinean migrants' relationships to their ritual practices must change as they remake themselves and their religion.

Islam and Muslim Life in West Africa

Islam and Muslim Life in West Africa PDF Author: Abdoulaye Sounaye
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN: 3110733358
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 243

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Book Description
The book offers an examination of issues, institutions and actors that have become central to Muslim life in the region. Focusing on leadership, authority, law, gender, media, aesthetics, radicalization and cooperation, it offers insights into processes that reshape power structures and the experience of being Muslim. It makes room for perspectives from the region in an academic world shaped by scholarship mostly from Europe and America.

The Walking Qurʼan

The Walking Qurʼan PDF Author: Rudolph T. Ware
Publisher: UNC Press Books
ISBN: 1469614316
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 352

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Book Description
Walking Qur'an: Islamic Education, Embodied Knowledge, and History in West Africa

Contesting Islam in Africa

Contesting Islam in Africa PDF Author: Abdulai Iddrisu
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781594609169
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Contesting Islam in Africa examines the experiences of "returnee" scholars, an emerging class of elites trained in Saudi and Egyptian theological universities, and their role in educational initiatives and the reconfiguration of Muslim identity in Ghana between 1920 and 2010. Based on oral interviews and significant archival work in Ghana and at the National Archives in London, the book addresses three questions: How did the returnee scholars conceptualize and rationalize local politics and Muslim life in a pluralistic society where Muslims are a minority? How did Ghana''s colonial and post-colonial governments react to the transnational spaces constructed by Muslims generally? And, given the returnee educational imperative, what has been the Saudi and Egyptian influence on the formulation of Muslim culture in Ghana? The book also explores the influence of local mallams, in particular Alhaji Yussif Soalihu (Afa Ajura), who was indefatigable as he almost single-handedly spread Wahhabism in Ghana. For any meaningful understanding of reform Islam and the "returnee" scholars in Ghana, its essential to appreciate the many facets of the life of Afa Ajura. The activities of Afa Ajura and his literate assistants created public controversy and sometimes led to open confrontation with religious adversaries, the Tijaniyya fraternity. These activities redefined intra-religious conflagration and turned Afa Ajura into a religious phenomenon. The many violent confrontations that ensued also attracted the attention of external actors not only interested in spreading reform Islam, but also interested in integrating Ghanaian Muslims into the wider world of Islam. This book argues that Salafism/Wahhabism was and in many ways remains a homegrown religious phenomenon that benefitted primarily from preexisting splits within the northern Ghanaian Muslim community. It also argues that transnational Salafism/Wahhabism and Middle Eastern and North African contact--especially through education and outreach programs--only provided the ideological justification and the grammar for reinterpreting the common good and for reconfiguring local social and political sensibilities. This book is part of the African World Series, edited by Toyin Falola, Jacob and Frances Sanger Mossiker Chair in the Humanities, University of Texas at Austin. "The influence of Wahhabism in sub-Saharan Africa remains one of the least-investigated areas in African studies at a time when tensions, mistrust and religious conflicts have increased. By examining the role of the returnee ulama (Muslim scholars) and their organizations in creating new Muslim identities modeled on their Arab funders, in stark contrast to the Africanized versions of Islam practiced by their own parents, grandparents or relatives at home, the book promises to shed new light on the changing face of Islam in traditionally peaceful and tolerant Muslim societies of sub-Saharan Africa." -- Fallou Ngom, PhD., Associate Professor of Anthropology & Director of the African Language Program, African Studies Center, Boston University "The study of Islam in Africa has not attracted a lot of scholarly attention because the focus has tended to be on the colonial project in Africa. The great moment in the manuscript is when the author asks this question: ''How do we explain the intensity of these clashes - Muslim against Muslim - in a religiously plural country where Islam remains a minority religion?'' This is an important question because the tendency has been to see conflict between Muslims and non Muslims and yet this book promises to provide a totally different type of analysis. The manuscript provides insightful overview of some of the tensions in the past, by looking at conflicts that have occurred in the past. ... Using lucid and great narrative, analytical and interpretative style, the author takes on a rich array of issues that have not attracted a lot of attention in African history. It is a project that deploys primary and secondary sources in a remarkable manner. It will be a useful addition to literature on the spread of Islam in Africa. It is likely to have a great impact on our knowledge of Islam in West Africa in general and Ghana in particular." -- Maurice Amutabi, PhD, Associate Professor, The Catholic University of Eastern Africa, Nairobi, Kenya "The author was able to connect the spread of Islamic education in line with the Saudi Wahhabi doctrine fueled by the return of graduates from the Islamic University of Medina and the influx of Islamic books that promote the Salafy ideology into Ghana and the decline of Tijaniyya in Ghana." -- Dauda Abubakar, African Studies Quarterly

Themes in West Africa’s History

Themes in West Africa’s History PDF Author: Emmanuel Kwaku Akyeampong
Publisher: Ohio University Press
ISBN: 0821445669
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 459

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Book Description
There has long been a need for a new textbook on West Africa’s history. In Themes in West Africa’s History, editor Emmanuel Kwaku Akyeampong and his contributors meet this need, examining key themes in West Africa’s prehistory to the present through the lenses of their different disciplines. The contents of the book comprise an introduction and thirteen chapters divided into three parts. Each chapter provides an overview of existing literature on major topics, as well as a short list of recommended reading, and breaks new ground through the incorporation of original research. The first part of the book examines paths to a West African past, including perspectives from archaeology, ecology and culture, linguistics, and oral traditions. Part two probes environment, society, and agency and historical change through essays on the slave trade, social inequality, religious interaction, poverty, disease, and urbanization. Part three sheds light on contemporary West Africa in exploring how economic and political developments have shaped religious expression and identity in significant ways. Themes in West Africa’s History represents a range of intellectual views and interpretations from leading scholars on West Africa’s history. It will appeal to college undergraduates, graduate students, and scholars in the way it draws on different disciplines and expertise to bring together key themes in West Africa’s history, from prehistory to the present.

Servants of Allah

Servants of Allah PDF Author: Sylviane A. Diouf
Publisher: NYU Press
ISBN: 081471904X
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 264

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Book Description
Explores the stories of African Muslim slaves in the New World. The author argues that although Islam as brought by the Africans did not outlive the last slaves, "what they wrote on the sands of the plantations is a successful story of strength, resilience, courage, pride, and dignity." She discusses Christian Europeans, African Muslims, the Atlantic slave trade, literacy, revolts, and the Muslim legacy. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Islam and Social Change in French West Africa

Islam and Social Change in French West Africa PDF Author: Sean Hanretta
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 0521899710
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 329

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Book Description
Exploring the history and religious community of a group of Muslim Sufi mystics in colonial French West Africa, this study shows the relationship between religious, social and economic change in the region. It highlights the role that intellectuals played in shaping social and cultural change and illuminates the specific religious ideas and political contexts that gave their efforts meaning. In contrast to depictions that emphasize the importance of international networks and anti-modern reaction in twentieth-century Islamic reform, this book claims that, in West Africa, such movements were driven by local forces and constituted only the most recent round in a set of centuries-old debates about the best way for pious people to confront social injustice. It argues that traditional historical methods prevent an appreciation of Muslim intellectual history in Africa by misunderstanding the nature of information gathering during colonial rule and misconstruing the relationship between documents and oral history.

Women and Islamic Revival in a West African Town

Women and Islamic Revival in a West African Town PDF Author: Adeline Masquelier
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253003466
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 377

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Book Description
In the small town of Dogondoutchi, Niger, Malam Awal, a charismatic Sufi preacher, was recruited by local Muslim leaders to denounce the practices of reformist Muslims. Malam Awal's message has been viewed as a mixed blessing by Muslim women who have seen new definitions of Islam and Muslim practice impact their place and role in society. This study follows the career of Malam Awal and documents the engagement of women in the religious debates that are refashioning their everyday lives. Adeline Masquelier reveals how these women have had to define Islam on their own terms, especially as a practice that governs education, participation in prayer, domestic activities, wedding customs, and who wears the veil and how. Masquelier's richly detailed narrative presents new understandings of what it means to be a Muslim woman in Africa today.